There are too many open-world video games

Open-world video games have been around for a long time, but it seems like over the last five years there has been an abundance of them on the market.

If you aren't familiar with what an open-world game is, there are also known as free-roam or sandbox games. They are video games where a player can move freely through a virtual world and is given considerable freedom in regard to how and when to approach particular objectives.

The same could be said about any video game genre, sports, shooters, etc., but they don't have many different titles within a year. There is only one NFL, one MLB, one NBA game released per year. There are two, maybe three, shooters per year. That gives gamers enough time to play through a game before the next one is released.

If you do a Google search for "list of open world games in 2016," there are 11 different games that come up. Eleven. There were only eight major sports games that game out. If you count the smaller titles, the total goes up to total rises to 15. However, sports games are a more casual experience that doesn't require a lot of time invested into the story.

The most famous open-world franchise arguably is Grand Theft Auto. We've seen GTA games since 1997, 20 years of this franchise. The Sims has been around for just as long, if not longer.

Just to see exactly how many open-world games exist in total, I turned to Wikipedia. There are over two pages worth of open-world games. Some of the major franchises on the list are:

There are plenty of others that I didn't mention from the past, present, and future. Horizon Zero Dawn will be the newest addition to the last when it comes out in March.

I'm not talking bad of these games. I actually own a few of these games and I enjoy them greatly. They provide hours of gameplay with the main story, side missions, and free roam. But, I just need some time apart.

With how long it takes to finish these games, even just the main story, gamers can't get to all of these games. As we try to play all of them, we spend less time with a particular game.

With school, work, and a social life, it becomes difficult to schedule time to sit down and finish these games. Then, with time away from the game, you forget where you are in the story and lose interest. Granted, everyone is different, but this seems to be the most common result.

I love playing open-world games just as much as I like Madden or BattleField or Rock Band. Getting lost in the world, the characters and trying to complete as much as possible. They're fun. I just think the amount of them saturates the market and takes away from the specialness of each individual game.